Brooklyn-based ceramicist and painter Stephanie Temma Hier is one of New York City’s most exciting up-and-coming artists. This title stems from her paintings and ceramic sculpture hybrids that poke fun at traditional gender roles and other constraints the patriarchy has imposed on women. For example, a particular work titled Mouth Piece is a large ceramic mouth rendered in a nearly grotesque caricature-like fashion. Her mouth is opened wide, and she wears cherry red lipstick. Where her tongue should be, a rose garden is found instead.
At the surface, the piece is a commentary on the patriarchy’s policing of women’s bodies. One that dictates that everything from a woman’s mouth odour to body hair and vaginal odour should be non-existent, despite it being a part of normal biological functions. This social policing effectively renders women as an object without bodily functions and without human rights.
A deeper investigation into Mouth Piece will also reveal how the piece criticizes men’s policing of women’s voices. This social policing calls for polite women, women who always maintain their speech and demeanour. It calls for agreeable women who never say no, even if it hinges upon their boundaries. Again, these are social norms that keep women bound by the rules of the patriarchy, never to fully meet their potential. Mouth Piece is simply one of many Stephanie Temma Hier pieces that poke fun at society’s gender norms. This is why artworks by Temma Hier are relevant to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal of Gender Equality.
In another piece, titled Hands made of heaven, Temma Hier investigates women’s bodily autonomy. The piece is Temma Hier’s rendition of a cheese grater as a glazed stoneware sculpture. On one side, she has painted a nondescript body part. Whether they are the voluptuous curves of a woman’s waist or the long arch between her shoulders and neck, the painting focuses on the hands that hold the body tight, to the point that they look like they might leave a painful mark.
As the piece’s title also focuses on these hands, it can be inferred that the painting’s structure, the cheese grater, is meant to be what being touched by these hands feels like. A feminist reading of this piece would suggest that it symbolizes the patriarchy’s policing of women’s bodies. This is a state where any or all affairs concerning a woman’s body are dictated to by anyone other than the woman themselves. In today’s patriarchal society, this policing can be done by everything from boyfriends who control what their partners wear to lawmakers who make decisions on women’s reproductive rights.
Stephanie Temma Hier’s ceramic-painting hybrid pieces offer satirical yet meaningful critiques of the patriarchy’s control over women’s bodies and voices. Through pieces such as Hands made of heaven and Mouth Piece, Temma Hier exposes the absurdity and cruelty of the societal expectations imposed on women. By using humour and bold imagery, she invites her audiences to question actively and challenge these norms for an equitable future.
Find out more about ceramic-painting hybrid pieces by Stephanie Temma Hier and their other initiatives by checking their Instagram on @stephanie.temma.hier.